Katherine (Kit) Brown-Hoekstra, Comgenesis
July 1, 2024

It’s easy to be a good leader when everything is going smoothly, and your team is working well. But, how do you cope when everything is going sideways, both at home and at work? Are you able to keep your cool? To manage your responses in a way that helps the team stay focused and productive? To go beyond just alleviating the symptoms toward generative, creative solutions that innovate?

Our system evolved when things were trying to eat us, and danger was all around. For most of us, those conditions no longer exist, and yet, we are more stressed out than at most other times in history. As sociobiologist Dr. E.O. Wilson so eloquently stated, “We have Paleolithic emotions, Medieval institutions, and god-like technology.”

Even with the best of intentions, when you are stressed, it can be challenging to keep from reacting in a way that harms more than it helps. Blame your physiology—our systems are designed to react quickly to threats. Our system evolved when things were trying to eat us, and danger was all around. For most of us, those conditions no longer exist, and yet, we are more stressed out than at most other times in history. As sociobiologist Dr. E.O. Wilson so eloquently stated, “We have Paleolithic emotions, Medieval institutions, and god-like technology.”

The good news is that we can learn to modify these reactive responses and lead ourselves back to a place of creativity. Even better, many of these techniques are free, available to us 100% of the time, and are deceptively easy to learn (though challenging to master).

Here are three ways to short-circuit the cycle of reactivity and stress:

  • Take a Deep Breath: We must breathe 12-20 times per minute just to stay alive. When we are stressed though, our breathing becomes shallow and less effective, which then adds to the stress response as our brains demand more oxygen. To break that cycle, exhale completely, then inhale for ~5 seconds, exhale for ~5 seconds, and repeat at least 3 times. By slowing and deepening your breath, you brain gets more oxygen, and your nervous system calms down. Try this the next time you are feeling stressed.
  • Pause. Notice. Choose. Viktor Frankl (Holocaust survivor and psychologist) taught us that “between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” We can’t always control what happens to us, but we always have control over how we respond. When we learn to pause before reacting, we give ourselves and those around us the opportunity to respond with creativity rather than reacting emotionally.
  • Tend and befriend. It’s easy to become isolated in today’s world, especially when we work from home. When we don’t see each other in person, it’s easy to miss the clues that our friends and colleagues need connection. And, when we are stressed or hurting, it’s normal to want to curl up under a blanket and shut out the world. However, even introverts need connection and belonging—human beings are hard-wired for it. When we don’t get enough connection, it changes our bodies and brains. We saw this during the pandemic with the rise in mental health issues, and with numerous studies on developmental issues in children who are neglected. Taking a few minutes every day to connect in small ways or to do something kind, can help you and those you care about.

These techniques are easy to learn and take a lifetime of practice to master. Even the Dalai Lama struggles with reactivity at times. We are only human, after all.

A huge part of being an effective leader is being aware of and managing our internal state so that we are influencing and interacting with those around us in ways that promote creativity and teamwork. And, by the way, even if you do not have a formal leadership role in your organization, in the broadest sense, you are a leader in some aspect of your life.

Join Dawn and me on July 11th for a Content Wrangler podcast, Conscious Leadership: Guiding Change and Directing Influence.

If you want to take a deeper dive into what it means to be an effective, conscious leader and how you can build on your knowledge and habits, join me starting August 12th for a 6-week online course, The Leadership Toolbox at https://comtechservices.com/event/leadership-toolbox/. In each session, we will cover an aspect of leadership and tap into our collective wisdom to support each other on our learning journey. I hope to see you there.

Katherine (Kit) Brown-Hoekstra is an award-winning consultant in localization and technical communication. As Principal of Comgenesis, LLC, Kit helps global companies design and build content systems so they can serve global customers wherever they live and work, in their preferred language. She is an experienced conference speaker, trainer, and facilitator. She currently explores conscious leadership and appreciative inquiry as a Certified Guide in the XCHANGE community. She is also a Fellow and former Society president for the Society for Technical Communication, coauthored a book on managing virtual teams in 2007, and in 2017, edited The Language of Localization. Her blog is www.pangaeapapers.com.